It will be seen, on reference to the journal, that the system of moral restraint and instruction adopted, and the vigilance with which it was enforced, prevented the sailors from making any aggression until the voyage was more than half over; and that they were invited then only by the weak state of the prison; presenting scarcely any opposition to those who might wish to gain admission. It will also appear that some of the sailors were removed from the ship at Hobart Town, Van Diemen’s Land, for disorderly behaviour towards the prisoners: these men were afterwards sent up to Sydney, as prisoners, in another ship, but on their arrival there were set at liberty, without a single question being asked them, or the slightest investigation instituted. I confess I was desirous that the affair should have been inquired into at the time, when the allegations might have been confirmed or disproved by the testimony of those who had been eye witnesses of the transactions for which those men had been arrested; and satisfactory evidence of the circumstances of the whole voyage would then have been obtained, those who were most competent to give information being on the spot. This is the more to be regretted, because the practicability of moral reformation in those ships would have been proved beyond the possibility of cavil, _if the prisons be properly secured, and the Surgeon Superintendent supported in the discharge of his duty, and in his endeavours to accomplish an object of such desirable and paramount importance_. It is not from the impregnable structure of the prison in a convict ship, that the great object of transportation is alone to be sought. The arm of the law, which deprives the convict of the power of committing mischief by sanctioning the coercive bolt or massy bar, can be as effectual in restraining the licentious seaman from transgressing the bounds of duty, and committing acts of violence towards the persons confined; such are powers of ordinary and every day efficacy. Will they, in the silent hour of night, in the lowering retreat of meditated guilt, reach the mind in its secret recesses, and confine its aberrations from rectitude? No: recourse must be had to means much more potent,—boundless as created space, which will embrace all the deviations of the soul, and, with a shepherd’s care, prevent its dangerous wanderings. Religious influence, the enlivening, all-pervading force of conscience must be called up to aid in checking criminal intention, to recall grave recollections of the past, and turn the soul to chastening, penitent reflection. Vain are all endeavours to amend, unless error be struck at by a fundamental, unshowy energy, to clear away effectually the noisome weeds that choke the paths of virtue.